Surest Sign of the Dining Apocalypse in 2013

Stein’s pick: There is an alarming dearth of modestly priced restaurants. As the middle class is squeezed, so too are middle-class restaurants. I’m brashly oversimplifying things here, but there are oligarch feeding troughs, cheap-o foodie finds and little in between. It could be—I’m open to admitting—that these modest restaurants fly under the radar, bereft of a P.R. budget and buzz-producing apparatus. But even if that is the case, that they are so silent and undiscussed is worrisome.

Ozersky responds:I completely agree. This is one of the biggest ongoing issues in the restaurant world. The restaurant middle class is disappearing, not coincidentally, as the middle class that once supported it. This is a much darker chapter in the city’s culinary history than even most professional observers realize. Kudos to Mr. Stein for underscoring it.

Ozersky’s pick:The ramen burger

Stein responds: I wouldn’t get my panties too much in a bundle about a trend, which is clearly a flash in the pan. By next year, the ramen burger will have dissolved into a puddle of stale hysteria, soggy noodles and cold ground beef.